


six times Skye was called a not entirely adequate name and one when she presumably wasn't

by nausicaa_of_phaeacia



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: 6 +1, Coulson thinks Skye is the best thing since sliced bread, F/M, Gen, Post Jiaying, Post-Season 2, Skye and her Huge Crush on Coulson, caution: mushy, celebratingskye
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-05
Updated: 2015-06-05
Packaged: 2018-04-03 00:42:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4080016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nausicaa_of_phaeacia/pseuds/nausicaa_of_phaeacia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>See label.</p>
            </blockquote>





	six times Skye was called a not entirely adequate name and one when she presumably wasn't

**Author's Note:**

> I had to. Sorry.  
> Also, I didn't know what to do about the ending. I hope it still turned out kind of okay.  
> And shoutout to zauberer_sirin because I keep using her tags without asking. Sorry. And thank you. :)

**1\. mary sue**

It's tough for her, tougher than it is for most other kids. The others always get to be chosen by childless parents, spoiled by the nuns, and later on, accepted for a reasonable job. She keeps and keeps running away, but apart from the one time she's actually found by one of the younger nuns, she's forced to return to the orphanage for lack of food, work or money. Some times, it takes longer than others. That's how things go until she's thirteen and taken away by hard-working, neurotically Christian foster parents. They make her go to morning service every day, and confess to the rumpled, trembling father every weekend, interrogating her about it afterwards. Every single time, the priest asks for the girl's name when hearing the child's voice, and every single time, Mary Sue feels the need to invent sins to tell him, for she keeps running out of bad things she's done. Of course, she does do things like steal a chocolate bar from the cupboard or going to school without homework. But that's somehow not what the father seems to be expecting to hear, and as she's getting older, her idea of an actual sin broadens. As she's sent back away to the orphanage (when the parents "can't cope with the child anymore"), and the nuns make her continue going to the same church, she doesn't always have to make them up anymore. Mary Sue is one of the bad girls; Skye isn't, she tells herself under every new bedroom ceiling. When she's finally signing her farewell papers, she vows never to sign anything with that name again.

**2\. janet leigh**

Her first real job is at the world's most hopeless bar. The contract her butcher-type boss-to-be puts in front of her is the first thing she's ever signed since the orphanage, and she doesn't feel like dignifying Bob the Butcher with a name such as Skye. Besides, she hasn't thought of a last name yet. He keeps staring at her seventeen-year-old boobs and accidentally touching her in places where she's never expected to be touched, whenever she bends down to get the garbage bin. She remembers the only movie she's gotten to watch at her foster parents' place (she wasn't allowed to wish for anything material for her birthday, so it was one film-length of television on her fifteenth) and signs the sheet as Janet Leigh. She'll remember smiling to herself; the boss is so dense he doesn't even realise it's an actress' name. The customers keep asking for "Jane" and her legs, and for a while, she doesn't mind putting on the shortest of skirts every night. It's her job after all, and why shouldn't she feel the least bit powerful while she's at it. The hollers keep getting more and more vulgar, and before she actually dares to quit her job (she hasn't found anything else yet), she gets sacked when one of the younger customers convinces Bob that hers is a fake name.

**3\. sophie charles**

It happens some years and just a few boys later that a guy walks up to her from behind in a café and doesn't deliver your average pick-up line. He doesn't talk about her eyes or her tight top with the very socialist print on it or about how he's been watching her from the other end of the room. he walks up to her very shyly and says, _what's your name?_ People normally don't ask her that; she's rather one to introduce herself when she deems it necessary to get to know someone. That's why a bit more than the usual beat passes before she answers; her first idea is to say _Skye_ but that seems to still be a lie, a product of lonely late-night teenage imagination. _Sophie. Sophie Charles_ , she says, and it sounds surprisingly true, at least in that moment. The guy goes on about how he knows she's the only one who can help him, and she's just about to smack him, but then he talks about proxys and how one of his shady businesses went south because a partner bailed on him. For two days, she sees him as a mere customer, but when he tells her that the code she's writing in the middle of the night in an abandoned van that he "found" is beautiful, that's it. It takes another month and a lot more nights together in the shabby van's creaking bed (some much more interesting than others) before she tells him she doesn't exist. He just replies, _good, we'll have to be invisible for a while anyway_. The next time he compliments her on her skills, she rewards him by allowing him to call her Skye, especially when someone asks for her skills. Then, she becomes one of the Tide's most prominent figures, her voice speaking live to more than four states. After a few weeks of frantic scribbling for preparation and putting on the kettle for the honey-spoiled peppermint tea she always drinks before going on air, he runs. Quietly. Sneaking out in the middle of the night, leaving only a short message on the back of a gas station receipt. He forgets to put an _e_ at the end of her name. At least she gets to keep the van.

**4\. lola**

She has grown up in the meantime and it's for an undercover mission, of course. She's still smiling about Jemma, who kept complaining there were practically no hiding possibilities for bugs underneath the provocatively low-cut red dress. May carefully instructs the scientist how wardrobe can be expanded to a very essential character trait of the persona one uses to gather all relevant information from one's conversational partner. Not in so many words, of course. But the red dress really is exceptional, rather something Romanova would excel at pulling off at all times, Skye thinks. It all feels like some kind of weird, solitary prom she's never had until the guy arrives and she pretends to already be quite temptingly tipsy on mojitos (the guy falls for it within a minute). It's actually quite fun to play spy games, she tells herself, until she almost blows her cover because she's enjoying the give-them-a-grain-of-truth method a little too much. _I met a cute guy once who compared me to a red Corvette_ , she tells the guy (who doesn't lose even one second to make comparisons concerning her shape and tight dress), _just imagine, his car's name was Lola! that's my name_ , she giggles into his ear. It's Coulson's irritatingly low, but completely surprised-sounding _Skye! what the heck!_ in her ear, instantly reminding her that the whole team can hear her over the comms, that almost gives her away, almost making her forget about strategy details. In return, she's going to stay and actually _drink_ some of these mojitos, she decides.

**5\. jane**

It's been almost two years since she joined he team and everything is in shambles. She's kind of used to that; but this time, things are different, even more so than the last time. Coulson and her were joking about rebirth the last time, but now, it feels even more like things are being built up from scratch. On fridays, when they go out to have a meeting about the anonymous tactical unit (incidentally, always to the neighbourhood's best restaurant), she usually calls him a one-winged phoenix whenever he expresses the smallest doubt against himself. He keeps reprimanding her playfully that she shouldn't be flirting with people who (a) have Asgardian enemies or (b) have been subjected to neurological experiments concering one's brain or who (c) are oddly reminiscent of a Jane Austen ending. She's not stupid, of course, she's had her helping of _Jane Eyre_ , and responds by elbowing him lightly, telling him it's Rochester who gets the girl. That's usually where this exchange stops and they order some lunch. There's this one time, though, where the restaurant's been crowded by an abominably large group of chattering tourists and the waiter is not to be reached through the heaps of luggage and selfie sticks. It's the only time he smiles and says, _come on, Jane, let's go somewhere else_ before guiding her outside through the sunglassed maelstrom, his hand flat against her back. 

**6\. daisy johnson**

She'd never have thought she'd ever willingly use that name. But things have changed, and even more so since Jiaying's war and Cal's T.A.H.I.T.I. It still breaks her heart that he went through the program willingly, her promise to visit enough incentive for him to give up everything. Bobbi keeps telling her it's the only way for him to finally be at peace, and she keeps hugging her for it. She's been visiting his veterinary practice time and time again, just dropping by without going in, or pretending to be visiting someone upstairs. Lately, she's been going to events the practice is hosting: gatherings, picknicks with dogs and the like. She's promised to help them run registrations at a bunny competition next week, Cal invited her to, and she wasn't able to say no. He'd remember her first name, but ask for her last. It may be her imagination, but she thinks that his smile upon hearing her full name was Daisy Johnson is universes warmer than any smile he's cast at her before. 

**\+ 1**

It's actually for a dinner reservation. Coulson's been kind of overcompensating the loss of his hand by working even harder than he used to (she wouldn't have known he had any more work capacity inside of him): Covert team strategies, anonymous recruitment offers, new headquarters blueprints, equipment orders, budget plans, even scheduling bionics talks with Stark (she wonders briefly if she should get involved in the whole thing, remembering Stark's glances at her when she'd hacked his system and succeeded getting into one of his storerooms to get the corresponding Tide podcast on air). However, now that the team has been scrambled up again (May's on leave, Bobbi's quit all active assignments and taken on an office job, Jemma's still in recovery, Mack's been reassigned, and Fitz is getting additional tactical lessons) and they're just trying their hardest to put things back together again, to finally create a functional and fair structure combining S.H.I.E.L.D., "the other" S.H.I.E.L.D., and conditions for top secret anonymous teams around gifted people, Coulson really is in need of a break. 

She kind of sneaks into his office one evening and reminds him that he hasn't eaten actual food in days. It makes him smile; she can see he hasn't had a minute of free time in a long time. He asks her to call a restaurant and make reservations for the two of them. Until he tells her the restaurant's name - it turns out he wants her to have a nice evening out for the first time since, well, _everything_ happened, and is taking her to a very elegant place - she's not even surprised (with all the secret tactics-for-two meetings they've had). She tries not to show any change in her expression, but with their history, she knows he can tell. With a nod, she leaves and promises to call. The nod he gives in response is touchingly thankful. 

Out on the corridor, she calls right away, her heart pretty much in her throat. When the nice elderly lady on the other end asks under which name she should enter the reservation, she's momentarily stressed, then blurts out, _Oh, yeah, sorry, it's Coulson, excuse me_. After hanging up, she lets her head fall back against the corridor's wall, gesturing with her fingers as a pistol. _Bravo, Skye. Way to get nervous just because you're getting dinner with your boss._ It's not even the first time they've eaten together, more or less secretly. There have been several cases of Playground ravioli, of burgers and hot dogs on recruitment trips, of an unbelievable casserole at the safehouse, of exhaustment chips on the office floor. This shouldn't be any different. 

It is, though, when they meet. It's not just that Coulson is looking unbelievably nice - it feels so unusual to see him without his office suit (because _Coulson_ even wears those to road trips trying to hire people all over the freaking continent), but also that Skye's wearing a beautiful flower dress she hasn't even considered looking at in ages. She can almost hear Coulson gasp from across the street, even though there's nothing special about the dress, it's plain as hell, but it's different, it's not like anything else she's been wearing during the past six months (at least). She kind of expects him to offer her his arm (because that's what gentlemen do, right?), but he takes her by the hand instead, and their smiles meet in the middle. 

The place is goddamn huge and there are, like, crystal chandeliers and candles and waiters in tuxedos everywhere, and she's not sure where to look, how to walk, but Coulson seems to know, so she guesses it's fine. They walk up to the reception desk, and he looks at her expectantly, so apparently, she should be explaining. _We've made reservations for today,_ she tells the cute receptionist girl, _for 8 pm, I think it should be table 24._ The girl nods, her smile almost too much for Skye and the strange warm feeling in her stomach, her finger caressing handwritten names on a list. _Ah, yes, that's right. Table 24, Mrs Coulson. My colleague will show you._

Suddenly, Coulson's eyes meet hers, and there's so much she can read there apart from the usual smirk: boundless incredulity, unexpected joy, and something more that makes the warm feeling in her stomach spread to her fingertips in a kind of nervous flash and tug at her ribcage. She shrugs and just smiles, provoking him to beam at her as they follow one of the waiters. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for bearing with me and my hiatus ideas. ;-)  
> Hope you liked it!


End file.
